A community of practice of teaching English writing in a Chinese University

Abstract

This study explores the practice of collective lesson planning involving one expatriate and five local instructors as they taught English argumentative writing at a university in Mainland China. By conceptualizing ‘a teacher group’ as a community of practice (CoP), the study illustrates how the observed collective lesson-planning conferences carried on a local tradition to guide students in taking a morally acceptable stand in their writing and how the more and less experienced teachers worked together toward a shared understanding of how to teach. The participating teachers, with unequal statuses and experiences, not only worked collaboratively to sustain a community coherence of pedagogical practice but also negotiated to develop a diversity of individual practices in the collective lesson-planning conferences. The study suggests that collective lesson planning is more than a ‘joint enterprise’ with ‘mutual engagement’ to achieve a ‘shared repertoire’ but a contact zone of power relationships among members labeled as old-timers or newcomers, expatriate or local teachers.